Светлана Жарникова – Ornamental complex of the Nort of Russia (страница 7)

VOCM 3439/25

Lady's hat. Severodvinsky. 19th century VOCM 3439/16. Photo by V. Tarasovsky 1988

Borushka tarnogskaya 19th century 20927. Photo by V. Tarasovsky 1988

Lady's hat. Severodvinsky. 19th century VOCM 3439/25. Photo by V. Tarasovsky 1988

VOCM 18660. Photo by V. Tarasovsky 1988

NV (scientific auxiliary fund) 7991. Photo by V. Tarasovsky 1988

VOCM 3439/91. Photo by V. Tarasovsky 1988

VOCM 3439/111. Photo by V. Tarasovsky 1988

Lady's hat. Severodvinsky. 19th century VOCM 3439/22. Photo by V. Tarasovsky 1988

Olonets province

Ivan Argunov. Portrait of an unknown peasant woman. 1784

Mezen. 1900

Shabelsky collection 1900

Shabelsky collection 1900

Zharnikova Svetlana Vasilievna

Attempting the interpretation of value some images of Russian folk archaic embroidery

(According to the article of G. P. Durasov)

Russian folk embroidery of the archaic type was the object of research of many scientists. A very extensive bibliography of works devoted to this issue is a vivid confirmation of this. The works of A. A. Afanasyev, A. K. Ambroz, V. S. Voronov, V. A. Gorodtsov, L. A. Dintses, G. S. Maslova, B. A. Rybakov and many other researchers, the genesis of Russian folk embroidery patterns has been largely revealed ... But since in life in general and in science in particular, there is hardly a question that could be given an absolutely exhaustive answer, in this case, researchers are attracted by the tempting prospect of offering their own interpretation of the semantics of the most ancient compositions of Russian folk embroidery. One of such attempts is the article by G. P. Durasov, published in the journal "Soviet Ethnography". On the basis of extensive archaeological and ethnographic material, the author made an attempt to find out the reason for the appearance of the image of a two-headed eagle in Russian folk embroidery and to determine the meaning of this ornamental motif. According to G. P. Durasov, this is a symbol of heavenly fire.

G. P. Durasov notes that the pattern in question can most often be found in the embroidery of the North and North-West of Russia, where it was used to decorate clothes (shirt hem), hats and towels (ends). A two-headed bird with lowered or raised wings was included in a complex frieze composition, one of the components of which was quite often the figure of a woman with raised or lowered arms. In Russian folk art, in particular in folklore, the idea of fire was associated with a bird - a rooster, a falcon, an eagle, or rather; fire was often associated with the images of these birds. In addition, this ornamental motif (the image of a two-headed eagle) is most typical for the embroidery of the North and North-West of Russia, where the slash-and-slash (fire) farming system prevailed from time immemorial.

The above facts allow G. P. Durasov to draw the following conclusion: “It can be assumed that in this region there has long existed a direct connection between the wide existence of patterns with a two-headed bird (heavenly fire) and a female figure (mother earth) and the preservation of the old slash farming systems ".

It would seem that this point of view, supported by statistical data on the distribution of undercutting in Kargopol, Vytegorsk, Pudozh and Olonets districts, is quite convincing and reasoned. However, it seems that it is still not an increase in the harvest of barley by 9% and oats by 17% on the undercut, and also not that the rye in the fields gave "6.1 itself", but on the "fire ground" itself 6.5 ", was the main factor in the preservation of the image of a two-headed bird (like heavenly fire) and a female figure (like mother earth) in the embroidery ornaments of the North Russian region. There was undoubtedly a definite connection between the two-headed bird and the female figure, but it seems to us that it had a slightly different character.

One can agree with G. P. Durasov that "the embroidery process itself was functionally, obviously, close to agrarian ritual actions." But the question is whether the double-headed eagle in these embroideries really symbolizes the heavenly fire. For doubt, I think there are more than good reasons. The image of the two-headed eagle came into Russian peasant embroidery only in the 17th-18th centuries, and became especially widespread in the late 18th - early 19th centuries, which is convincingly confirmed by the materials cited in the article by A.K. Ambroz (this article is repeatedly referred to by G. P. Durasov).

G. S. Maslova in her fundamental monograph, speaking about the widespread prevalence in the peasant embroidery of various provinces of Russia, the motif of the two-headed eagle with raised wings, notes: Russian linen manufactories of the 18th century, similar to the Yaroslavl manufactory "and further:" The name of this pattern in Pomorie is interesting - the tavern eagle, which may indicate one of the ways of its penetration into the peasant environment; the image of the coat of arms on the "tsar" tavern in the 17th century was not uncommon. "

It seems that it is more correct to associate the appearance of images of a two-headed eagle in folk embroidery with the general bureaucratization of the state apparatus of Russia, which began in the late 17th - early 18th centuries. Indeed, it was during this period that the official symbol of the Russian state - the two-headed eagle - appears everywhere: on money, on papers for official petitions, on milestones, uniform buttons, in tsarist taverns and even on vodka shtoffs.

The motif of the double-headed eagle, quite decorative, somewhat fabulous and at the same time laconic was not alien in its structure to the folk ornament. And he organically blended into the ancient ornamental compositional schemes, occupying the very center of these compositions. Now, probably, the statement that the center of any ornamental scheme is semantically more important than its periphery has become a commonplace, but in our case I would like to emphasize this again.

In compositions with a double-headed eagle, the regal bird is indeed always in the center, but it entered this compositional scheme relatively recently, not earlier than the 17th century. On either side of this central figure there are almost always ornamental, stylized, symmetrical images of birds, horses, trees, women with raised or lowered arms (Fig. 1).

All of them are components of a very ancient compositional scheme, into which he organically blended without breaking it at the turn of the 17th-18th century’s two-headed eagle.

But if the entire system of images of the periphery of the ornament, a clear symmetry of the motifs facing the center has been preserved, then the conclusion suggests itself: before the appearance of the two-headed eagle, there was another image here, which carried the most important semantic load in the ornament and outwardly somewhat resembled a two-headed eagle (since he was so painlessly able to supplant this ancient image).

Figure: 1. a - the end of the towel. XIX century. Kologrivsky uyezd Kostroma province.

b - a fragment of a valance. XIX century. Kargopol uyezd, Olonets province.

c - a fragment of the front part of the hem of a women's shirt. XIX century.

d - valance fragment. XIX century. Olonets province.

So what is this image? To answer this question, let us turn, following G. P. Durasov, to the works of V. V. Stasov, V. A. Gorodtsov, A. K. Ambroz, A. A. Afanasyev, B. A. Rybakov, G. S. Maslova and other researchers who studied the symbolism of Russian folk embroidery of the archaic type. All of them, noting in the peasant embroidery of a comparatively late period (XVIII-XIX centuries) the presence of various images of a two-headed eagle, consider a composition with a central female figure with raised or lowered hands to be more ancient. As a rule, riders on horses, birds, human beings or stylized trees appear symmetrically to such a figure (Fig. 2).

Figure: 2. a - the end of the towel (fragment). XIX century. (Vologda Regional Museum of Local Lore, f. 12534/72);

b - end of a towel (fragment), XIX century. (Vologda Regional Museum of Local Lore, f. 12534/1);

c - the end of the towel. Yaroslavl province. GME;

d - embroidery fragment. XIX century. (Arkhangelsk folk embroidery. M., 1954);

e - a pattern on a woman's shirt. XIX century, village Bolshie Halui, Kargopol district of Olonets province.

The structure of compositions of this kind, as well as the set of its constituent elements, is stable and is preserved in the embroidery on the ends of towels, on the hem of women's shirts, in the ornament of sarafans and aprons of women in the North of Russia. In a transformed geometric form (the so-called rhombs with hooks or toads), we find images of the ancient goddess of life and fertility in the ornaments of the hem of women's haymaking shirts. And in this case, our materials, I think, once again confirm the correctness of the conclusions of A. K. Ambroz, who defined in one of his articles a rhombus with hooks as an ancient agricultural symbol of fertility.

One of the leading motifs on the hem of the hayfields was the rhombus with hooks. It is known that such shirts in the North and North-West of Russia were worn by women on the first day of haymaking - the day when the preparation of fodder for livestock began for the entire long cold winter, on which, in essence, the welfare of the peasant family depended in the coming year.